--- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, "authfriend" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote: > > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Jonathan Chadwick > <jochadw1@> wrote: > > > > > > > > authfriend <jstein@> wrote: > > --- In FairfieldLife@yahoogroups.com, Jonathan Chadwick <jochadw1@> > > wrote: > > > > > > John Hagelin now routinely introduces Maharshi as "the greatest > Vedic > > scholar in the world." Are there any faculty from leading academic > > institutions who e.g. teach Sanskrit who agree with this? > > > > Is this a serious question, or just a rhetorical one? > > > I'm not sure. > > > > In fact, I'm not sure what John means when he says this. For > example, > > Ruhollah Khomeini was an accomplished scholar of Aristotle and his > > medieval Islamic interpreters: while this famous Ayatollah may not > > have been up to date on the American secondary literature on > Aristotle, > > for example, he certainly knew his stuff in the original languages. > > But is there anyone who attends meetings of, say, the American > Academy > > of Religion who would take Maharishi Mahesh Yogi seriously as > a "scholar" > > in a fairly strict academic sense? Or is this not what John means > by > > "scholar?" > > I doubt it; and, I doubt it. > > "Scholar" isn't really the appropriate word, > because strictly speaking it means, as you > suggest, academic-type knowledge. I think > Hagelin probably meant something more like > "the person who knows more about the Vedas > than anyone in the world." > > But MMY's knowledge is more experiential > and intuitive than academic; an academic > wouldn't be likely to recognize this kind > of knowledge unless he or she were a TMer > who had absorbed MMY's teaching, I should > think, and had had some experience of > his/her own. > > As to whether MMY is "the greatest" even in > the intuitive/experiential sense, I find his > teaching on the Vedas pretty impressive, but > I'm in no position to guess what MMY's peers > in this respect would say. >
Assuming he has any.
